The Time Is

The number of endangered insects is large and growing. The rate of destruction and degradation of natural habitats currently is so great that there are not nearly enough biologists to even catalog, much less study, the species that are suddenly on the edge of extinction. In Indonesia, approximately 1.3 million hectares of tropical forest were cut in 2001. In Argentina, 7964 metric tons of insecticides were used in 1998. In the United States, imported red fire ants have infested over 260 million acres in the southeast. These examples of threats to endangered insects continue to mount across the world. The time is now for agencies, scientists, conservationists, and land managers to promote the conservation of imperiled insects.